As the Internet of Things (“IoT”) continues to gain widespread market momentum in the industry, the promise of modern mobile connectivity and automation in a connected world of humans and machines will be made possible through the introduction of low cost IoT technology coupled with advances in software-defined networking. As such, network and radio design for the IoT likely will be a key driver for 5G mobile telecommunications technologies.
Fundamental to the development of IoT networks and a services model that leverages next generation mobile telecommunication technologies, such as Long-Term Evolution (“LTE”) and LTE-Advanced, is the end device that consists of building blocks, including a multi-mode wireless transceiver and application processors with integrated software intelligence to interwork with the existing and evolving mobility network infrastructure. To successfully design an IoT type product that enables mobile connectivity solution with extended battery life of 10+ years and works across multiple industry segments, designers need to build small form factor modules with the cheapest bill of materials that can operate reliably over several years without battery replacement.
While Third Generation Partnership Project (“3GPP”) standards in Releases 12 and 13 propose several feature enhancements such as Power Savings Mode (“PSM”), Extended Discontinuous Reception (“eDRX”), and Enhanced Coverage (“EC”) that span across various network functions to enhance the power savings, reachability, and battery life of such devices, these features alone are not adequate to fully realize the potential of network and IoT service provider's needs.
In addition, the non-IP data delivery model proposed by 3GPP for infrequent and small data communication via the control plane fails to address the end device upgrade strategy by not impacting battery life. Such low cost devices might need to be upgraded frequently with variable binaries (images) for potential firmware/software changes in response to the standards evolution and service dynamics adopted by the IoT service providers.